Investors' Soapbox PM

Tobacco Suit Has No Smoking Gun

The Schwab class action will likely end in a favorable resolution for the tobacco industry, says UBS Investment Research.

Updated Sept. 27, 2006 11:59 p.m. ET

UBS Investment Research

EARLIER THIS WEEK, U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein decided to certify the Schwab class action, a nationwide group of smokers who claim they were defrauded by cigarette makers' use of the term "lights" and purchased these cigarettes under the belief that they were less hazardous.

Although the words "tobacco stocks" and "litigation" have become synonymous in the past two...